Time to Celebrate a Birthday!

You know you're getting old when the candles cost more than the cake.
Bob Hope

Today's post celebrates the birthday of Aneta Stan, Romanian folksinger.  Next week, February 2, she will be 72.

When people get past a certain age, too many candles on the cake can activate the smoke detector.  That is why number candles are popular with those who have double digit birthdays.

Here's a birthday greeting in Romanian from Talking Tom.  Tom is about to give himself a lactose attack.  He's a virtual cat so maybe milk doesn't have that effect on him. Maybe he would be better off eating cake?



Video #1 was taken recently during a TV progam honoring Aneta Stan.  It's a folklore show from Romania that reminds me of the Bulgarian program  Ide Nashenskata Muzika. The name is Noi suntem români (We are Romanians). Everyone on stage is dressed in elaborate embroidered costumes and flags are everywhere because it's a Romanian national holiday. 

The song translates to Happy Birthday Beautiful Country. The dance to this is geampara, closely related to Bulgarian rachenitsa (apple-apple-pineapple).



Video #2 is Sarba din Oltina. Sarba or Sirba is a very popular dance in Romania and this one is from Oltina, a village in the Dobrogea region.



Music from the Romanian region of Dobrogea is characterized by odd rhythms that are similar to those on the Bulgarian side of the Danube, River of Many Names.  This song is in cadeneasca rhythm, similar to Bulgarian daichovo.

Video #3 is one of Stan's earlier videos taken 1974 during the bad old days when Nicolae Ceaușescu ruled the land. Romania didn't have color TV broadcasts until 1983, and during that period programs were on for only two-three hours a day because Romania cut back its use on electricity in order to pay back foreign debt.

The song translates to Young Men in Dobrogea.



Aneta Stan is a native of Dobrogea, and her home town is Cernavoda, the town with a nuclear power symbol on its coat of arms.This song is a tribute to her native city. What is really cool is the bagpipe (cimpoi) solo in the introduction. By the way, you can dance to this as well, it's a sirba.



If you enjoyed this you may also like:

Another Country Heard From: The Bagpipe in Romanian Folk Music

More Songs from the Romanian Folklore Region of Dobrogea

Some Famous (and not so famous) Folk Songs from Romania

There is a bio as well as a playlist of songs performed by Aneta Stan on the Cernavoda Blog (in Romanian).


This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

More Songs From the Romanian Folklore Region of Dobrogea

This week's post will feature some lively songs from the folklore region of Dobrogea.  I am not very familiar with the performers (except for Aneta Stan); nor the songs.  Although they may be popular in Romania, they are not so well-known outside the country.  The songs caught my attention, which is why they ended up on this blog.

The rhythms of Romanian Dobrogea have counterparts across the Danube in Bulgarian Dobrudja. Here are two examples:

Geampara - Rachenitsa
Cadaneasca - Daichovo

The Eliznik website goes into more detail about odd rhythms in folk dances from Romania.  Rustemul is also mentioned. I couldn't find any songs with that name, but here's the dance:



Now it's time to enjoy some very danceable songs by several Romanian folk artists. Although there is no dancing in these videos,  you probably will want to sing (and dance) along to them, and there are some very nice photos to go along with them.

The first song, by Natalia Serbanescu, is Mandra Floare de la Mare.I couldn't get a proper translation; Google ended up with  Proud Flower to the Sea. In the video you can see some pictures of the Romanian Black Sea coast. For all I know this is probably an ad for tourism:

The song starts as a cadaneasca, then changes into sirba rhythm. Sirba is another popular Romanian folk dance that was featured on a post about a year ago (see link at the bottom of this page).



The next song is a geampara, (a dance in the rhythm  of 7/16) performed by Ani Orheanu Stanciu: Sunt Fata de la Braila (I am a Girl From Braila). Braila is a port city near the Danube Delta. Some of pictures in this video are scenes from the Delta region. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.



Here's another example of geampara rhythm, performed  by Elena Ionescu Cojocaru: Mult ma doare inima (my heart aches...a lot). If  you didn't understand Romanian, you'd never guess this is a tragic love song. Your first impulse would be to dance to it.



Aneta Stan sings Eu Sunt Fata Dobrogeana (I am a Girl from Dobrogea), another example of the cadaneasca. If anyone knows the name of the flower in the picture, please let me know in the "comments section."  Aneta Stan is from the town of Cernavoda; there is a playlist of her songs on the Cernavoda Blog. 



If you enjoyed this you may also like:

The "Flavors" of Romanian Sirba

Crossing the River, Folk Songs from the Romanian Folklore Region of Dobrogea

If you're interested in music from Bulgaria read: Stamping it Out: Dances From the Bulgarian Folklore Region of Dobrudja


This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.